Tyseley Single Wheeler.

For contrast I'd rather see something from the other company. How about an Armstrong 439 class 2-4-0, in original form with broad gauge style splashes and completely exposed wheels.

(WIBN)

 

"Wow!" indeed.

The only report we've had of this 29th July presentation is that from MellishR - to whom many thanks from me. His description has cured my feeling of annoyance and regret that at the last minute I was prevented from travelling to Kidderminster.

Tyseley's estimate for the cost of completing the Bloomer was £60,000 in June 2009, "close to six figures" in June 2012, and £150,000 in August 2016. Finishing the engine has now been subsumed into a much bigger scheme costing around half a million quid.

This thread had died until it was revived a year ago by reports of magazine articles which suggested that a renewal of work on the engine was imminent. These articles were vague and misleading. Source?

Any further discussion about the Tyseley Bloomer seems pointless.

Harry Jack.

 

I can't help agreeing with some of what the previous poster says.
It seems to me they have made finishing the Bloomer itself a harder task and more distant prospect. Now it is part of a much bigger scheme, some of which is challenging to say the least, if not purely aspirational. I can't see why it wouldn't be better to finish the Bloomer first? Unless they have intelligence that funding the whole package will be easier?
I for one would happily donate to the Bloomer (if I thought there was a real ongoing plan to work on it), and probably even to a train to run with it, but the rest sounds vague and expensive, and I wouldn't want my money subsumed into that...

 

Mind you ISTR a number of posts in the past on the lines of what's the point in building/finishing t, it will never be able to do much useful to pay for itself. Whatever you may think of the plan, it does provide a scenario in which the locomotive will be making a contribution to the business.

 

Having followed this with some attention: from what has been stated here from Tyseley and from what Michael Whitehouse said at Kidderminster: firstly there has been considerable if unobtrusive progress with the Bloomer and secondly any donations to further it would be spent on it.
They have the motion in store and ready to erect. To do this they will need the axle boxes - which are planned if not in hand so that everything can be fitted together and assembled in place on the crankshaft. This would leave essentially major pipework in the smokebox and from the tender to the boiler - pump? one injector or two? - with finally a plethora of odds and ends -brakes, blower, checking the tender coupling, sanding, damper linkage etc. Probably time consuming in petty ways but it would be reasonable to say that the back of the job will have been broken so that it can be completed in smaller and cheaper steps and ready in good time for the opening of HS2.
It does seem reasonable to give it a sound priority that it should be steadily ongoing and to support this making it a bit more explicit that that there is a fund clearly allocated to it. I sense some champion for it on the spot might help. One would be glad to enable the locomotive's completion: it is not to be taken for granted that the people who first progressed this are actually still present and able to finalise the job. And it does seem to me that how to make the best of is chicken and egg: running it sooner will demonstrate how it can best do what it could do.
(There is certainly the argument that you don't want to set the boiler certificate clock ticking away if you are not going to have some appreciable good out of the use of the engine. But set against the uncertainties of the future, get a bird in the hand!)

 

Over quite a few years several people have asked if there is a fund specifically for the Bloomer scheme, but no answers have been forthcoming from Tyseley. The contrast with their very detailed description of how to contribute to the Defiant fund is very striking. I couldn't possibly comment, but I'll believe the Bloomer is completed when (or if) I ever see it finished.

There is no dedicated and audited fund, so this subject is not worth discussing.

 

I agree with Hirn above. Lets get it finished & running , then it can go into any scheme / preserved railway you like.

 

I read a thread on here a while back by Bob meanley where he put a massive list, without names or locations, of problems they have had with hiring out locos. So with that in mind my guess is that he wouldn't want to hire out the bloomer, I night be mistaken, so the only reason Tyseley would finish it would be if it was running AT Tyseley. So without the extras I would imagine it wouldn't be completed. Unless I'm completely wrong

 

Indeed I have knowledge of just this sort of thing within the another organisation happening at a remote base - care not taken with
lubrication and failure on the main line. This was with some motive p0wer which is well known to need watching and it affected trust
with the people who can be helpful giving you paths or not.
Tysley have spent a lot of patient persistent effort getting good formalised agreement so they can regularly timetable the Shakespeare Express
to Stratford on Avon by two routes and just recently to run over the last little bit into the bay at Moor Street in Birmingham. This has been over twenty years and more. They do not want to compromise this by any unreliability in their rolling stock however short the distance on a busy through line. Their maintenance standards are exceptional and they can not be so sure of other peoples.

 

Can anyone who was involved explain why the Bloomer project stopped in the first place. ? They seemed to have got it to quite an advanced stage some years ago and then just stopped. What were the reasons for that ? What were the intentions at the time for it ?

 

At one time Tyseley had great plans to build a proper railway museum, the flagship of which would have been the Bloomer. The GWR roundhouse was to have been rebuilt, and in addition to getting to work on the Bloomer Tyseley also began to collect a range of other exhibits, including Manning Wardle 0-6-0ST 'Abernant', ex-Fairbourne pacific 'Ernest W. Twining', and a pair of Leamington & Warwick horse trams. The funding, which I think was to have come from the city council, was pulled and so the roundhouse scheme was abandoned and the specially obtained exhibits dispersed. I think I'm right in saying that Tyseley carried on plugging away at the Bloomer for some years after that, but the cloth can only be cut so many ways and more lucrative larger engines eventually had to take priority.

 

Search for @bob.meanley posts within this thread for a first hand account.

 

I picked up a leaflet at the Tyseley open weekend about the bloomer. It will be great if the money comes in and it happens.

Also I have just seen a post on the Warley model railway page that the Bloomer is to go to Warley this November as one of the display/exhibitions.

It looks like this is now going to happen. Great news!

 

This is a declared aim of VT at Tyseley- to recreate the 'first high speed intercity train' in time for the arrival of HS2 in Brum (and that isn't an invitation for a load of froth regards the pros and cons of HS2! ).

 

The Bloomer single wheeler are on display at Warley model railway exibition these days I see from a video on YouTube

 

There are photos on the Warley Facebook page. I'm actually in the queue to get in and unload the lms patriot stand so I'll take some pics later

 

I own nothing - here’s the pic from Facebook.



I think I speak for everyone here - wow!

 

Very nice! I take it from the photo that it's been completed, or has it? (I guess the chimney has been removed for transport) Is it supposed to be a working loco or just a static exhibit? Even as a static exhibit, it will fill a gap in the British steam loco development story. I'd like to see it myself but I'm not able to visit the NEC Show this year.

 

That certainly looks impressive!

 

The NEC is big, but not that big! It looks like it's missing some boiler cladding, anyone know what else is left to finish it now? I've lost track of where it's at since the big fanfare announcement a little while ago that they were finally going to finish it.